Last November, former world champion Caleb Plant had the biggest fight of his career when he battled Canelo Alvarez for all the belts at 168 pounds. Plant fought hard and was competitive, but he would eventually suffer his first loss as Alvarez stopped him in the eleventh round.
Plant(21-1, 12 KOs) is back and will have another stern test on October 15 at Barclays Center in Brooklyn(FOX Sports PPV) when he battles former world champion Anthony Dirrell(34-2-2, 25 KOs) in a WBC Super Middleweight Title Eliminator.
Despite the loss, the 30-year-old Plant said the fight against Canelo taught him a lot.
“The biggest thing I took from the Canelo Alvarez fight is the experience in general,” Plant said during a virtual press conference on Wednesday. “Experience isn’t something you can buy. You have to go through it to get it. Obviously, I came up short, and there’s no excuses there. I got right back with my team and went back to work.”
For this fight, Plant added a new member to his team as he brought in trainer Stephen “Breadman” Edwards. According to Plant, he’s had great sparring for this camp, and Edwards has been a great addition to his team.
“I’ve been having a lot of fun in the gym,” Plant said. “This has been the best quality of sparring that I’ve ever had and the most success I’ve had in sparring during camp. I sparred Carlos Adames, Shane Mosley Jr., Kyrone Davis, and other great fighters. It’s been top-quality sparring. Having Stephen Edwards on the team with my dad has given us great chemistry. We’re relaxed and easygoing but also getting after it.”
There’s been a lot of trash talking between Plant and Dirrell, but come October 15, Plant expects to retire ‘The Dog.”
“He can feel how he wants, but he’s not going to do anything on fight night,” Plant said. “He says he’s ‘The Dog,’ but he does a lot of woofing. He woofs a whole lot because he’s a puppy dog, but he doesn’t follow through. He’s trying to hype himself up.
“I’m going to put a vicious whooping on him on October 15. I’m going to teach him a life lesson when we get into the ring.
“He’s retiring after this. He’s done. I’m going to beat him in such a way that he won’t want to be a part of this anymore.”
The 37-year-old Dirrell won’t be easy for Plant. This is an intriguing fight and a 50-50 fight. We’re going to learn a lot about Plant after this one. If he can pull it off, this would be the biggest win of his career and would help land him another title shot. If he loses, there will be a lot of questions about Plant.
